Anup Sidhu, Director Speciality Brands, Accord UK talks about the benefit of biosimilars for the NHS and patients in the third episode of our second series of Thinking Differently vlogs reflecting on the trends of 2021 and their impact on UK pharmacy.
Jump straight to the vlog.
The development of biological medicines has advanced treatment in many disease areas. As these biological medicines patents have expired it has led to a rise in biosimilar medicines.
Biosimilars are medicines that are made or derived from a biological source such as living cells or organisms1 and over the last 15 years we have seen an evolution in the complexity of molecules being approved as well as consistency of manufacturing quality. With biological medicines that have achieved blockbuster status coming off patent, combined with associated cost reductions, the NHS has been keen to maximise their benefit.
In 2017, the NHS launched a framework that set a target of getting at least 90% of new patients onto the best value biologic within three months of the launch of a biosimilar and at least 80% of existing patients within 12 months.2
This has created significant savings for the NHS, it is estimated that the NHS saves £300m per year using biosimilars.3 We anticipate that not only will the biosimilar market continue to expand, but generic and biosimilar companies will continue to build on those biosimilars with value-added improvements such as better delivery administration or digital education apps and services.
Often patients can be nervous about being prescribed a biosimilar or their medication being switched. However, pharmacists can help to reassure patients that biosimilars need to meet robust regulatory standards and have a similar safety and efficacy profile as the originator.
With the NHS firmly backing the use of biosimilars, we anticipate more biosimilars will come to market. These will provide both opportunities and challenges for the generic manufacturing industry and you can read more about these in our upcoming White paper ‘Innovation not Imitation’.
For now, Anup Sidhu, Director Speciality Brands, Accord UK discusses the rise of biosimilars in the third and final episode of our second Thinking Differently vlog series ‘Future trends affecting pharmacy’.
References
- https://www.england.nhs.uk/medicines-2/biosimilar-medicines/
- https://www.england.nhs.uk/wp-content/uploads/2017/09/biosimilar-medicines-commissioning-framework.pdf
- https://www.england.nhs.uk/2018/11/nhs-set-to-save-record-300-million-on-the-nhss-highest-drug-spend/
